


Hate is a strong word (to describe how I feel about you)

by lesbianbey



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: Character Study, Couples are as canon as they can get, I also love bitchy but reasonable vic, Multi, canon compilant, except for that onesided chaseprice, i just love chaseprice I’m sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-24
Updated: 2018-07-24
Packaged: 2019-06-15 10:06:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15410574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbianbey/pseuds/lesbianbey
Summary: Victoria hates Rachel.





	Hate is a strong word (to describe how I feel about you)

Victoria _hates_ Rachel.

That wasn't a secret around campus, since everyone knew both girls. Whether they want to admit it or not, watching both girls in the prime of their heated rivalry was entertaining. Victoria would find ways to make Rachel tick, often for her to get angry because Rachel seemed to be impenetrable. Whatever the fuck it was, Victoria couldn't figure it out and neither did anyone else.

But no one really knew why she hated Rachel. Some say it's a classic 'we used to be friends' trope in which something happened for both girls to fall out. Some, which is probably everyone who adored Rachel, hypothesized that Victoria was simply jealous and is projecting her jealousy with hate. Then there are those who think Victoria doesn't have a reason.

But she does. It's the first reason.

Only Nathan knows since they're best friends, but that's it. Around 2010, Rachel ditched a sleepover between her and Victoria to go to a concert. _Fair_. Victoria would've understood if Rachel explained. Then there was the selfie between her and...Chloe Price.

Victoria didn't really care for Price. She would often screw up her name on purpose because she honestly didn't give a shit about her name, even though she knew what the fuck it is. However, Price was...and still is, _undeniably breathtaking_ in the looks department. If Rachel were a lesbian as she claimed, Victoria understood why they had such a passionate relationship.

Then there was the tea incident.

Rachel got kicked out the play for skipping class so Victoria was the next of kin to be Prospero. However, Keaton never gave her any lines and she often complained about not being the initial star while skipping out on rehearsals so she was freaking out moments before her big break. She thought about her middle school acting coach, who told her to improvise every time she forgot her lines, but that wasn't gonna work. She hated Shakespearean English and she doesn't know any of her lines.

Chloe and Rachel come in the dressing room and while Chloe is convincing her to quit, Rachel slips horse tranquilizers in her tea. Victoria is unmoved by Chloe's persuading and downs her tea in seconds without knowing her tea was tampered with.

Then she faints while Keaton cries about Watson being stuck in traffic. She doesn't wake up until moments before the play ended. Taylor (her best friend) and the stage tech manager Stephanie Gingrich are by her side. Steph briefly mentions visiting her best friend Mikey North in the hospital and goes as quickly as she comes while Victoria turns to Taylor. "What happened?"

"You fainted before the play started."

Victoria groans. She concludes it was her crippling anxiety until she goes to the dressing room to gather her stuff and go back to her dorm to sleep some more. She finds an empty bottle of horse tranquilizers by her teacup instead, and flashes back to when Chloe was trying to convince her not to do the play while Rachel was behind her doing something. Victoria didn't know what it was but now she does. "That fucking bitch."

Since then, she has severed ties with Rachel and swore to nothing to make the girl pay for what she did. But she never really did. Rachel was impenetrable...not even when she was stabbed and had to be hospitalized for a little while. However she did have a small victory when she destroyed Rachel's favorite flannel shirt.

That is until Chloe gets her a new one and Victoria is back to square one. She growls to herself and claims defeat for now, until in early 2013.

* * *

Victoria often had to persuade an eighteen year old to get cigarettes because she was seventeen and it's January. Some of the older seniors she's cool with so she gets them from one senior named Carol-Ann with the curly auburn hair and the sparkly eyes that made Victoria swoon if she wasn't persuading her to get cigarettes. She would ask Nathan but he's on his weekly disappearing acts tonight.

She hides the box under her shirt just in case that crazy lunatic is patrolling the area like the crazy fuck he is. However, the RV parked at the parking lot stops her dead in her tracks. She doesn't usually buy anything from the residential drug dealer, but when she does, she travels all the way to the junkyard so they don't get caught. And either Nathan or Taylor accompany her. Courtney would string along but Victoria will tell her to go hide so it wouldn't be suspect.

She stares at the truck, noticing a hint of blond hair under the moonlight. Furrowing her eyebrows, Victoria hides behind a shrub and looks at the blond hair, scanning around the place until the door opens. The drug dealer opens the door and kisses the blond until he pulls them in.

The flannel tucked on her waist gives it away. " _Interesting_ ," Victoria mutters, smirking as she now has actual intel on Rachel Amber involving herself with Bowers.

She sneaks back into the dorms and waits by Rachel's dorm. She waits a total of an hour until she sees Rachel walking in, with an interesting swagger in her step.

"So, did you have fun with your rendezvous with Bowers?" Rachel freezes. "Hm. I wonder what Chloe Price would have to say about that—"

"You don't know anything," she whispers.

"I don't? So that wasn't you climbing in this recreational vehicle?" Victoria shows a clear picture of Rachel entering the RV, smirking. She has several pictures that she backed up on her phone just in case Rachel decides to delete them and she will send them to Chloe just as soon as she gets that girl's number. "I got you right where I want you, Amber."

Rachel narrows her eyes. "What the fuck do you want from my life?"

"Since you decided to put horse tranquilizers in my tea on that fateful day in May of 2010, I have sought out revenge against your scheming, basic ass and now that I have photographic evidence of your infidelity, I will make sure your wonderful girlfriend Chloe Elizabeth Price will get a hold of it, no matter how many apologies you can dish to me."

"That was three years ago. You can't still be mad—"

"Oh no Amber. I'm not mad. I'm _livid_ ," Victoria growls. "And I will stop at _nothing_ to reduce you to the little bitch that you are."

"You caught me," Rachel sighs. "I'm not the perfect person that everyone claims me to be. And...you saw right through me before another person can admit that. But please, don't show that picture to Chloe. She means a lot to me."

"No, she _doesn't_ ," Victoria argues. "If you gave even half a shit about Price you wouldn't even look at that drug dealer...not even once."

"You don't know anything about what I'm doing or what I'm trying to achieve," Rachel hisses. "I'm doing this for the sake of getting out of here. If you want to ruin that, go ahead, but that just proves how much of a hideous person you are."

"I'm hideous, when you're playing fiddle with people's emotions. I may be a bitch, but I don't hide it with a fucking smile and I surely don't lie to my friends or significant others about my fidelity and loyalty." Victoria shakes her head and pockets her phone. "You know what? If you don't tell Price about your relationship, I will. And trust me, she would _hate_ that she heard it from me as opposed to you, her actual girlfriend." With that, Victoria heads to her dorm with the deep regret of not sending it as immediately as she wanted to.

* * *

Victoria never gets the chance to reveal the photos.

When Rachel goes missing, Chloe is stuck on finding her as opposed to finding out about her infidelity and well, Victoria lets her have it. She watches Price run rampant around the campus she used to attend, inquiring everyone and their moms about Rachel's whereabouts. Victoria thinks it's pathetic and pays no mind to it until Price approaches her.

"Have you seen Rachel?"

Victoria wipes the little spit that landed on her face with a handkerchief and rolls her eyes to show off her general disinterest about Amber's disappearance. "Ask someone else who cares, Kari."

Price narrows her eyes. "I already did, and trust me, you are the last person I'm asking on this fucking hell of a campus."

"I heavily doubt that," Victoria shrugs off. "Anyway, why do you give a fuck about that bitch? Maybe this is your opportunity to become less of a lap dog and do something you want to do." Price growls and grabs Victoria's shirt. Victoria simply laughs as she doesn't give much of a care about her simple ass tee at the time. "Interesting. Do you always go around grabbing other girls' shirts or is it specific girls?"

It is a lot more flirtatious than Victoria expected but Chloe's expression is priceless. "What—" Chloe lets go of Victoria's shirt and looks at her in disgust. "Answer the fucking question, Chase. Have you seen Rachel?"

"The last time I saw that bitch she was partying like mad at that party," Victoria answers honestly. "Maybe keep a leash on your bitch and she won't go loose. But wait, you follow her every move so maybe _you're_ the bitch?"

Chloe clenches her fists. "If you insult me or Rachel one more time—"

"You're gonna punch me in the face. Honestly Price? Get better threats. You told me that when I cut Rachel's shirt up. Nothing's gonna change. Plus, what makes you think I'm not capable of beating your ass?" Victoria narrows her eyes and steps closer to Chloe's face. "Go ahead bitch, try me."

Before Chloe could get a punch in, a large arm separates both ladies. "That's enough, Chloe. Leave the campus or I'll have you arrested for trespassing."

"Listen to step-daddy, Price." Victoria wasn't exactly thrilled that David Madsen broke up an impending fight but she really didn't want to talk to Price anymore about something she didn't give a shit about. "Go away."

Chloe growls at David and Victoria, and stomps away to her truck. Victoria knew from that moment that whether she showed the pictures or not, Chloe Price would still be delusional as ever. But she's still hot, Victoria thinks to herself and smirks before going back to her dorm.

* * *

Finding out about Chloe and Rachel's deaths was bittersweet for Victoria. She hated Rachel and only thought Chloe would be a great fuck for one night but other than that a general nuisance. However she showed up to the funeral not only because Maxine Caulfield invited her but because she felt that it was only kind of right after letting Nathan's demons kill two people instead of helping him.

Chloe should have known before she got shot. It's only fair to know about Rachel so that Chloe would live a longer life and not worry about finding someone who didn't actually care about her. Victoria sighs to herself when she kicks off her black high heels and drops back first on her bed. She rummages through her images, finding the incriminating photos of Rachel and Bowers in an illicit relationship. There was no reason to keep them — "Better to remember her as what she fronted than who she really was," she mumbles to herself as she deletes them one by one. She scrolls back to a video - a recent video of her neighbor Kate Marsh kissing some dudes at a party one weekend. She already posted it but had deleted it moments after the shooting but she still had it as a backup.

She deletes it also and shuts off her phone for the rest of the night.

When Victoria wakes up the next morning, she feels different. Knowing it isn't her period, she ignores it and takes a shower, then turns on her phone and texts Taylor to see if she was up for some Belgian waffles. "Just keep it moving, Chase," she says to herself. "There's no need to dwell on the past."


End file.
